Your Vogue history

Sass & Bide

IN New York it became quite the trend to somehow turn winter into summer for next season. We're looking at you Michael Kors and Thakoon and now, in London, we're turning our attention to Sass + Bide. It's perhaps hardly surprising - these two hail from the sunny climes of Australia and so the sun and heat are second nature - and manifested themselves in a collection entitled Wintergate this evening, one full of bursts of daffodil yellow and slinky little dresses full of the joys of summer.

Last season Sarah Jane Clarke and Heidi Middleton had given us origami folds and tight shapes, architectural and elaborate with it. This time round they tamed and toned it down which made for a more instantly wearable outing to begin with - wide-leg trousers and squared-off jackets, little dinky skirts and a plethora of silver knit - before moving onto the Sass + Bide wardrobe we have come to know so well.

In stepped warrior dresses and caged overlays; embellishment of raffia, beads, pearl and diamante smothered over little sinuous dresses or those with dropped waists and monochrome cut-outs on top. The pair had elaborated that this was a collection of opposites, about transformation and counterbalance.

More readily what you could take away from it was a good dose of optimism on the wardrobe front when it comes to those winter months. And if on those days the sun does come a-shining, then one of those little dresses, all decorative and shiny, will surely catch your eye. And if not, there is the option of a knit.